Slashdot Mirror

So uh, has wine been ported to windows yet? Just asking ;)

These people might disagree Wine.

Damn right I'll wine! It works great!

I've run Dell's BIOS updater under Linux. Might I introduce you to Wine?

Not cutting edge anymore, but I've been playing Rome: Total War on wine - it's not great, but playable. C&C3 also (supposedly) works, but I don't have the beef on my system to check that out. Check the Appdb http://appdb.winehq.com/ for more that do. It's quite an impressive list for a reverse-engineered hack of a (not) emulator...

It's the linux users that run stuff on Wine, after all :-)

"Worry as much about his favourite DE as much as you worry about his favourite wine."

What really takes the biscuit is being sent a "tall ball," then they forget they are developing on and for Linux and send you a .RAR file :-(

Luckily the free (as in beer) version of WinRAR runs perfectly under WINE.

And don't get me started on the spaces in file names and the CRLF line endings in the C source and PERL scripts... and shell scripts!

It's not about repeating the "party line" (to be honest, I don't think there is one), I'm not really a Wine developer either (although I've had 2 small patches committed), I'm just presenting the situation the way I see it.

Currently I can't say: function x, it gets executed by Acrobat Reader 2.1, Firefox, fuzzycalc and Darly's Printshop. So the person who implements it can test it with these applications that make use of it.

Strictly speaking, you're right, but that data is fairly easily accessable. For example, here's a tiny script that'll give you said information (just feed it a +relay trace), I just wrote it in the span of a few minutes. It could be useful to integrate such data with the AppDB.

I understand that a function does not need to be 100% implemented. But think about a sponsor who says: I want to sponsor dll x. Or: My program WAccounting uses these 5 API calls, I want this program to run perfect under Wine, what does it cost me?

In general, people don't seem to care about how much of a DLL is implemented, they care about if their programs foo, baz and bar work. Most of the major investments into Wine have been to make a particular program (or set of programs) work, such as Google with Picasa (list of patches), or Corel with Wordperfect and CorelDRAW (until Microsoft threw a large chunk of money at them).

In a similar vein, Codeweavers offers porting services for Wine, ie, they'll make a particular application work, and they can give you an estimate of how much it'll cost, on a case by case basis.

What also motivates people is to see a kind of progress bar. I mean a automated script that indicates how much stubs and so on are in there.

I agree that people like progress bars (so do I), but they can be deceptive. For example, the Wine status pages have an automated script that guesses the completion status of all DLLs based on the contents of the .spec file for each DLL, but this isn't always accurate. For example, the .spec files don't seem to contain all functions for a given DLL, (I'd guess any COM functions aren't in there, as they're special, AFAIK), and while the automated tool thinks that d3d8 and d3d9 are 40% and 20% completed, respectively, the actual case is closer to 95% in both cases, based upon developer inspection.

I also would like to get informed how to debug an application with Wine. The documentation is heavily outdated and imcomplete here. WINEDEBUG=+relay is intresting, I tried it out. But the documentation is not very informative here.

Here's the complete list of WINEDEBUG channels, as well as some useful registry keys, and a debugging tutorial. Generally when you're debugging something, WINEDEBUG can be very useful with the right channels selected.

My perception is that we will get
- almost perfect DirectX games support
- very good installer and crypto support.
because here it really does scale but wine development did not scale that much over the past years.

Actually, as I menti

Some of my thoughts, in no particular order:

- The Officially Sanctioned API (TM) for OS X apps is Cocoa. This is basically an extension of OpenStep. So is GNUStep. GNUStep even aims to implement Cocoa's extensions so as to allow Cocoa apps to be linked with GNUStep. However, for the time being, compatibility is incomplete and only at the source level. You might have some luck compiling GNUStep apps on Cocoa/OSX, but not running compiled Cocoa apps on GNUStep/Linux.

- Some people tried to get Darwin binary compatibiltiy into NetBSD. However, the project is now dead, purportedly due to lack of user interest. This is the only Darwin binary compatibility project I am aware of. What this means is that, at the moment, you can only run Darwin (AKA OS X) executables on Darwin.

- QEMU is a fast and open source emulator that can be used to emulate, among others, x86 PCs, AMD64 PCs, and Power Macs. This should allow you to run OS X as a guest OS. If you use QEMU to emulate an x86 on an x86, or an x86 or AMD64 on AMD64, it should run close to native speed. That is, as far as the CPU is concerned. Other hardware, graphics hardware in particular, will not have native performance.

- I've been a GNU/Linux user for over ten years. I also used Mac OS X for a couple of years. Eventually, I got frustrated with it and installed Linux on my iBook. I've never looked back. Of course, I am primarily a GNU/Linux and BSD user, which causes the little (sometimes significant) oddities of OS X to frustrate me. If you're primarily an OS X user, this will likely work the other way around.

- GNU/Linux does have some definite advantages over OS X. Just throwing down a few: more customizability, easier maintenance (given a decent package manager, such as apt-get), better compatibility with open-source software, and several possible advantages that depend on your choices: lower memory usage, lower latency, lower disk usage.

- Given that you have a Mac, OS X also has some advantages over GNU/Linux. Among others: it supports your hardware (what you get from Apple, anyway; Linux has the edge when it comes to third-party hardware), companies are more likely to support it (think software, hardware, and manuals), and ... well, can't think of anything more right now.

- As for why there is no compatibility layer yet: probably just because it's a monumental task. Think about how old Wine is and how well it works. Then think about Apple's yearly OS upgrades. Then consider that Apple has also moved architectures (PPC -> x86) since the introduction of OS X, and probably will again (x86 -> AMD64 - they ship that hardware, but the OS is still at least mostly x86). Then look at GNUStep and the instructions for building it (you're allowed to shiver at this point). A Mac OS X compatibility layer won't happen anytime soon.

"Does that mean Wine won't even be listed in the package manager?"
Not by default (have not tried Ubuntu 7.04 yet). You have to visit http://www.winehq.com/, browse to the download section and follow the directions to add the WineHQ APT Repository to your system's list of download sources.
This is not exactly what a newbie might expect, but since WINE is still "early beta" quality, I would not recommend it anyway for people who dislike tinkering with the system. As WINE gets more mature, I expect that it will be officially included into the Ubuntu distribution at some point.

First of all, it would be short sited not to include Microsoft in this kind of project. Remember that Microsoft still has some social responsibility and since it's a world player it would make sense to "sponsor" a project like this. However, they should not be asking any money off it. In fact, they may even be able to use it as a tax write off - if that is possible in the US(?).

Further more, there is just so much more educational software available on Microsoft - especially older versions of MS DOS, Windows 3x, Windows 9x. Yes, I know they are no longer supported, but I am sure Microsoft could make an effort in supporting these older games - or even bring back some kind of limited support for their older OS's.

This does not however mean that Linux has lost - it merely defines what we as a community can do to guarantee Linux a spot in this market: develop quality educational software, or, let the likes of the Wine Project focus on compatibility for these older "games". That would mean that potentially Microsoft does not have to support older versions of Windows any more (since the Wine community can now do that), and it could even mean that a company like Novell or RedHat could also now start to act on their social responsibilities by supporting the Wine Project.

In the end, I support the philosophy behind the project, and personally I will take any OS and Software available to help some of the poorest children on Earth.

Just a quick last word from my side: I have a flash light with one of them handles to wind up to load the batteries. I can not see this concept fly on this Project, but if it does we will have some well developed poor people able to knock down walls with their fists :)

more information about the alky project: http://www.winehq.com/pipermail/wine-devel/2007-Ap ril/056237.html

1.x was not kinda buggy, it was produced by "arnieboy", a guy who had no fucking clue what he was doing, and breaking systems left and right. And when Ubuntu developers tried to help and discuss improvements with him, he refused to listen and acted hurt and persecuted. I know, I was there and followed the discussion. I swore I would not touch anything this guy produced, and warn everyone I could. Then update time came and I was hanging out on ubuntu-users fixing broken systems.

Automatix 2 did less stupid things but still some, and still broke updates. I frankly don't care about 3 :)

I also don't see the value of it anymore:
I understood making installation of unfree stuff simpler (although I still don't get what's so hard following the help), but this is taken care of in Feisty anyway.\
Wine has its own repos for newer versions, and anyone playing with wine dev versions should know how to add a repo.
All Ubuntu packages are single-click install anyway, I dunno why anyone need Automatix for it. If there is a usability issue in finding them, the Automatix guy should better work with the distro people to fix it if he cares so much.
I cannot check for the other stuff (scripts) since getautomatix.com is down.

Linux users do not have to pay for software

There, I fixed your purposeful omission it for you.

take responsibility for your own needs and write the software you want.

Isn't free software up to the challenge?

Where have you been for the past twenty years?

The DMCA does introduce some issues since circumvention of a copy protection device becomes a crime, but that didn't happen here. Patents can also create huge problems for reverse engineering, but that doesn't apply here.

Case study: http://www.winehq.com/

If reverse engineering were illegal, don't you think Microsoft would come down on them like a ton of bricks?

I have been trying to get windows-based games to run for quite some time, and with the exception of a few favored games (WoW) and some old ones that were really simple, not much works at all, let alone with hours of tweaks.

What games aren't working for you? Remember, just because you can't get it working doesn't mean that it doesn't work just fine for other people. Instead of mislabelling me a "troll", perhaps we can work through your problems with WINE.

The first thing you should try is installing the latest version of WINE, which is currently 0.9.34. It would help if you gave more details about your system, as well. What version of X are you running? What OpenGL implementation do have installed? What version of GCC are you using? What distribution are you running?

unless it is graphically intensive (dx9, requiring 3d acceleration) everything can either be emulated (wine) or virtualized (xen or vmware). unfortunatally there is no such thing as a free lunch - there is the additional cost of maintaining the extra layer, and ever for highly optimized applications there is still a performance hit (5% or so)

I've seen wine run IE6 before

Wine http://www.winehq.com/ should do it ok for free, used it in crossover from codeweavers, http://www.codeweavers.com/compatibility/browse/ca t?cat_id=33 that works ok, if you like you can download a linux VM ware image http://www.vmware.com/vmtn/appliances/directory/ and vmware player http://www.vmware.com/products/player/ for windows to test it out without having to play around with the live cd or have to restart.

If you want to test crossover theres always the *wink* *wink* *nudge* *nudge* ways of getting it for free.

Just for your information, the GLORIOUS wine project will eventually have a reverse-engineered implementation of the DX10 API, for all the UNIX flavours it supports, AS WELL AS WINDOWS. Check it out... http://winehq.com/?issue=325#DirectX%2010%20For%20 SoC?

Short quote:
"Jokes aside, there aren't any dx10 apps yet, except some demo apps. The first one to be expected is Halo 2 on April 24th afaik. The only thing is that MS has created some hype around dx10 recently. It would give us some nice publicity if the Halo 2 box states "Runs on Windows Vista and higher" and winehq.org says "Runs Halo 2 on Linux, MacOS, Windows XP and earlier"

I have no idea about what you are saying. The Wine web site still says it is NOT an emulator.
http://www.winehq.com/site/myths
Perhaps you can point to where they did say it was an emulator.

But you right about the Irony. I ranted needlessly when I saw the Wine myths and did not read carefully enough when the parent was in fact debunking those very myths. For that I apologize.

"I would not characterize WINE as an independent implementation of the Windows API" -- Dsanfte

"Wine is an Open Source implementation of the Windows API" -- WINE

Who to believe, who to believe...

What are you talking about? Apple is free to implement the DirectX API for "their" operating system whenever they choose to do so. Ever heard of Wine?

http://www.winehq.com/

OpenGL runs faster than Direct3D. A lot faster.

So, by your saying, Microsoft is always ahead, right?

Yes, if you're just copying what we do. Since we do it before you copy it, and copying it takes nonzero time, we have a nonzero time to keep moving. Mathematically, you can never catch up, because you don't know what to copy until we release it.

As far as your list goes, why don't we copy the Linux world more? Because... well, we don't want to. We do things when they're a good idea, not when someone else does them.

I'm talking about 100% Windows-compatible software, just like 100% IBM-compatible hardware. Linux isn't 100% Windows-compatible. If you want to compete with Windows, you can't do "everything Windows does". You have to do something different and call it better. You can't JUST be a copy. You have to be more than that.

Well, except for the part where it sucks, but you guys are working on that - right? ;)

http://kb.wisc.edu/helpdesk/page.php?id=5175
It's interesting as wine approches 1.0 microsoft newest operating system has compatibility issues with win32 applications. new vista pc sales will slump even after vista's service pack is released. My prediction is computer oem's whom are not offering linux pre-installed will suffer and pressure from isv's not abandonning win32 will only make vista less attractive. Microsoft's will not be able to get the "pawns" to ditch win32 and this will be the death of microsoft's monopoly over win32 co-insiding with a http://winehq.com/ 1.0 release. wine will keep microsoft honest and keep them in the win32 business for the long haul.

Microsoft could provide what http://winehq.com/ will do eventually. This would be the best way to bring windows compatibility to linux.

http://winehq.com/

WINE

Which is what everyone says. That shows that you don't know anything about the present-day Linux desktop. Question: what mainstream app is missing from the business computing desktop environment?

1. Microsoft Outlook?Evolution and Kontact replace Outlook quite handily. Evolution can use the Evolution-Exchange Connector to communicate through Outlook Web Access (which many Enterprises enable anyway) and provide full Outlook functionality in Evolution. Kontact can use full Outlook functionality if configured correctly (not so user-friendly, but still quite possible). In addition, the junk mail filtering is better, using the locally installed SpamAssassin filter.
2. Microsoft Office?All but the most complex spreadsheets and Word documents can be handled by OpenOffice without any problem. I doubt that the complex ones even pose that much difficulty in migration. Microsoft Access is still used in some minor applications, but it's trivial to import the data to another, better RDBMS. There are several free GUI clients for managing the new database. MySQL has good desktop database solutions. You'd have to use pretty much every proprietary feature in Access to have this be a sticking point.
3. Internet Explorer?Ah, yes. The basis of the antitrust suit. I admit that if your organization went out of its way to find webapp software that worked only in IE, you might have some migration issues. However, IE6 runs quite well under emulation on recent versions of WINE, so unless that ActiveX component they chose is really screwed up, there's a good chance you can even emulate that. JavaScript migration issues are less of a problem than they used to be (another favourite sticking point) so Firefox will likely work well for a lot of apps that weren't designed to protect Microsoft's monopoly.

Well, the list goes on. Custom-written software (could work well under emulation unless designed specifically to thwart WINE), IP Telephony (Skype has a Linux client), and so on. My point is that any business that's interested could switch today if they wanted. There's no missing killer app (unless you're trying to make excuses). The roadblocks to migrating entirely to Linux on the business desktop are all artificially created by Microsoft to protect their monopoly. The most difficult part is convincing your users that it's a good choice. They've been brainwashed by years of Microsoft marketing, and believe pretty much every word that comes out of Steve's and Bill's mouths blindly. Many organisations will encounter significant resistance during training as belligerent, brain-washed Microsoft junkies demand that things go back to the way they were. That's unfortunate, because I can finally say after almost 15 years of using Linux, that using a Linux desktop is a joy, not an arduous task that requires command-line hacking to accomplish everything it can do.

Turning Aqua into WINE.

Oh, wait... that's backward.

I don't think it is legally possible to make a 100% windows clone....nevermind that those with the skills to do it would not want to.

Of course it is. Lest you forget, that's exactly what the Wine project is, not to mention "mini clones" like the (name escapes me) product that allows MS Office to run on Linux. I'm just frustrated that no one throws a ton of money at the idea and does it "for real". Like it or not, Windows is the defacto industry standard desktop-application API.

Part of the reason why their job is mind-numbingly complicated is because they need to support legasy software. A whole lot of 16-bit DOS apps written 15 years ago still run on current versions of Windows. These are not ports, or recompilations, but the same binaries. I doubt the same can be said of Linux or MacOS, especially with the latter so efficient at cutting off support of applications with major release.

I guess you've never heard of DOSEMU, a program that uses the Linux kernel call "vm86" to run 16-bit DOS programs in the vm86 mode of 386-compatible processors ? Most 16-bit DOS applications I've tried on it have worked just fine.

Or you could use DOSBox, which is a complete emulator (meaning it emulates the processor too, unlike DOSEMU). The odd DOS app that didn't work under DOSEMU works fine under DOSBox.

It's the support for Windows applications (via Wine) that is less than perfect under Linux, but it is improving. Then again, it could hardly be getting worse ;).

I wrote a patch that mostly fix the sound popping issues, find it here. Let me know if it works for you.

Does anyone else see this as an incredible boost to projects like Wine and ReactOS? Given that up until now they've had to use Chinese Walls and so forth to figure these things out, it seems to me that this court order is going to save them a *lot* of effort.

The gaming scenario in Linux has never been better.

No, Linux still isn't at the point where any and all games that run in Windows will run in it...but installing WoW with Wine is trivial if you install Wine via something like apt-get. Neverwinter Nights Warcraft 3, Diablo 2, Starcraft, the original Half Life, Unreal Tournament, UT2k3, the Quakes, SimCity 4 and Steam are also possible. Some of these even have native Linux ports/installers.

For most people these days, WoW is also pretty much all they need anywayz...it also runs in FreeBSD with the Linux XF86-libs package.

Granted, with the exception of WoW, none of the above games are very contemporary...but as the trolls Zonk regularly links to point out, there aren't really any games worth playing being released at the moment anywayz.

So don't pay trolls such as this one any mind...go to , and look up your favourite PC game. 98% of the time, you'll find that with a minimal amount of mental elbow grease, you'll be able to play it under Linux just fine...and that usually translates by extension to FreeBSD as well.

You have a few options:

1. Run Windows natively but unplug your CAT-5 cable or disable your networking devices under the device manager. Having no internet access under Windows fixes this and many other problems nicely.

2. Are you really sure that the graphics applications you use require Microsoft Windows? I think that you would be very surprised by how good the support is for most Adobe products, including Photoshop, using WINE.

3. Run Windows and your graphics applications in a virtual environment using VMWare. Unless your graphics applications require advanced, DirectX-based rendering or some such thing (unlikely), then this will work great too.

Hope that helps!

Yes it is

"That said, the documentation is often bad, nonexistent, and even misleading where it exists, so a fair amount of reverse engineering has been necessary, particularly in the shell (Explorer) interface."

Just wondering. How easy is it to reverse-engineer a massive closed-source piece of software (like, say, MS Windows)?

Such a reverse-engineering job would be of obvious commercial interest (especially to parties who work in countries with lax regulatory regimes), so there is an obvious incentive to do it.

WoW doesn't have a Linux client. The only way to play WoW in Linux is to run it through either Wine or Cedega.

You can run other games through them as well.

The first paragraph of Wine HQ explicitly says that Wine runs on x86 Unixes. That's hardly ambiguous.

I'm not sure it's the goal of every open source developer to turn a project into a feature-rich, widely adopted juggernaut. Feature requests might have been brushed aside out of deference to project goals, which can sometimes be as unambitious as "We needed a free tool that did X, Y, and Z and now we have that."

While it would be great if the GIMP could burst onto the graphics scene going "I'm the widely adopted Juggernaut, bitch" we may have to just face the fact that it's already topped out in terms of features and development milestones. If the GIMP remains a pet project, then so be it. There are plenty of other projects that are turning a corner, such as Inkscape and Krita. Heck, Photoshop fans might even be pleasantly surprised by how well their favorite graphics program runs under WINE.

In any case, we need not be concerned that all of our eggs do not fit in this one basket.

Did you try wine? http://www.winehq.com/

One thing: Mac's have the advantage of having MS Office support.

Ever heard of WINE?

http://www.winehq.com/

(Comments in brackets are generally not directed at this post's author, but rather members of the usual /. peanut gallery who are likely to flame me for deviating from standard groupthink)

2. Migration. What to do with mailbox files that go back to 1993, for example, or more importantly, other documents created in Windows-only programs? I could save a computer just for Windows, of course, but how would I migrate these documents that are historical and artistic in nature if I need to update them?

For word processor documents, you'd need to figure out whether said file formats are binary, or primarily textual. If they're binary, there probably isn't a whole lot you can do...if however they're primarily text with proprietary markup, opening them in a hex editor or possibly even plain Notepad will allow you to get the text out of them. From there you can simply paste it into whatever other application you want. For graphics you should be fine, as there aren't a lot of completely unreadable proprietary Windows graphics formats about that I know of. (Unless we're talking about vectors, of course)

1. Inertia. There are six machines in the house and we both work at home. As longtime computer users, we have habits. Linux means re-learning a lot of those habits, from mousing styles to keyboard shortcuts. And it would mean learning how to connect the whole mess together and have it work -- without massively losing productivity in the meantime. That potential loss matters when you're self-employed and depend on your own knowledge and learning to get you through.

You need to figure out specifically what it is that you want/need to do before you can solve this problem one way or the other. Form a list of your usual tasks, and then do some research to find out how Linux handles those specific tasks. That in turn will tell you how difficult adapting is likely to be.

3. Applications. This is talked about over and over, but the dicussion often ends up with the most popular office-style applications. There are clones (and improvements) of these, and the graphics software is improving. But there are not yet functional equivalents to programs like Sonar, Finale, Sibelius, and Adobe Audition -- nor the literally hundreds of small applications that I use, some only for a few minutes each day.

Two websites can help here. The Wine website, which is about a Windows emulator for Linux that can run a large number of Windows programs, with varying degrees of success, (it has a database of known apps) and Freshmeat, which is more or less an OSS equivalent of Download.com, and can thus help you find Linux native applications that do the same or similar things to those you use on Windows.

Also, in terms of "small applications," you might want to consider learning some shell scripting. You may well find that not only can you write shell scripts which duplicate the functionality of your small Windows apps, but that even more, they can potentially do so without you needing to be in front of the keyboard.

4. Hardware. After total failure trying to get Red Hat to work about three years ago, I gave Ubuntu a run last week. It only recognized about half my hardware (but not any of the pro sound hardware, just the low-grade onboard audio), saw all my hard drives and network but none of the other computers on the network (all set up via TCP/IP). This was pretty darn good, but not good enough -- because the sound hardware doesn't have Linux drivers, it turns out, and without those, there was no point to pursuing it until that hardware investment is obsolete.

Red Hat is to be avoided, as is anything rpm based. Mr Shuttleworth's heart might be in the right place, but Ubuntu also seems to have some fairly serious problems as well, from what I've been hearing lately.

I'm going to get flamed for this, but it's good advice, so I don't car

Stick ubuntu on a machine, download the latest version of wine from the winehq repository http://www.winehq.com/site/download-deb , try out your app, if you have no joy there then head over to http://www.codeweavers.com/products/download_trial _linux/ and try out crossover